//------------------------------// // Vivan Los Pegasos // Story: My Little Pony: Friendship is Absurd // by Lord Seth //------------------------------// “So!” said Suri as she approached Flim and Flam. “I was wondering if you might be willing to do me a favor.” “What’s in it for us?” asked Flim. Suri frowned. “The point of a favor is that you don’t have self-interest in it!” “When was the last time you did somepony a favor without having some level of self-interest?” asked Flam. “Don’t change the subject,” said Suri. “Anyway, how about it?” “Wouldn’t it make more sense to say what the favor was before expecting an answer?” “I guess it would,” said Suri. “Anyway, anypony who I ever try to go out with quits after the first date, so I was hoping maybe one of you could go on some pretend dates and see if you can figure out what’s going wrong with how I act on said dates.” “I–” started Flam before Gilda suddenly popped up and interrupted him. “Don’t do it!” screamed Gilda as she grabbed Flam. “I know how this goes! You’ll–” “I think she was asking Flim,” said Flam. “Oh, sorry,” said Gilda as she let go of Flam, then grabbed Flim. “Don’t do it! I know how this goes! Anytime two people do some kind of fake romance like this, they end up falling in love for real! It’s how it always happens in fanfics!” “You read fan fiction?” asked Flam. “I skim,” said Gilda. “Anyway, don’t do it!” “Okay, Gilda,” said Suri in an exasperated tone, “there are two notable issues with your complaint. First, that wouldn’t actually happen with us. Second, even if it did, why do you even care?” “I don’t want to have to deal with that kind of nonsense!” said Gilda. “Do you know how annoying it is to have the group dynamic interrupted by two of the people in it starting up a relationship?” “Um… no?” asked Suri tepidly. “Neither do I!” said Gilda. “But I don’t want to find out! Pointless shipping is a major ruiner of fanfics!” “Gilda, this is the stupidest…” started Suri before her cutie mark, along with those of Flim and Flam, suddenly started glowing. “Oh, hey, Tree of Whatever mission. Let’s go see what it is.” The group went over to the map to see the cutie marks of Suri, Flim, and Flam floating above it. “Las Pegasus?” asked Suri. “Excellent!” declared Flim. “We’ve got an all expense paid vacation!” “I don’t think it’s actually paid for,” said Suri. “I think we have to pay for the trip out of our own money.” “Well… if the pattern for map missions holds, we should get more than enough cash at the end to pay for the whole trip!” said Flam. “Besides, even if we don’t find anything, it’s a good excuse for a vacation. We might even be able to write it off as a business expense! Where in Las Pegasus is it? Zoom in!” The map did indeed zoom in. “Ooh, a resort!” said Suri. “Even better! Even if we don’t find anything, we’ll get to relax.” “Oh, you three are not going alone,” said Gilda as she pointed at them. “I’m going to follow you to make sure pseudo-romantic hijinks don’t occur, like you accidentally getting uncomfortably close during a dance. I’m not going to stand for that kind of nonsense.” “This kind of absurdity on your part feels more like something Trixie would do,” said Flim. “Nah,” said Gilda, “she’d be all for you getting together. She’s even got names for pairing you up, Slim for Suri and Flim or Slam for Suri and Flam. Which are the same as her names for pairing either of the two up with Sunset, now that I think about it, which makes things confusing.” Gilda grabbed her head in frustration. “Why do I know this?!” “But the map doesn’t indicate you should go,” said Flam. “Therefore, you’re exempt from the trip.” “Oh?” said Gilda. “And what is the map going to do about it?” Lightning suddenly came from the map and zapped Gilda. “Okay,” said the charred Gilda after she coughed, “that was clearly an electrical malfunction. My statement was completely coincidental. I’m still going with–” Lightning again came from the map and zapped Gilda. “Again, malfunction!” declared Gilda. She moved away from the map. “All right, I’m far enough away. So again I insist on going with–” Yet again, lightning came from the map and zapped Gilda. “Oh, fine!” she said in exasperation. Suri, Flim, and Flam made the necessary preparations and went to the train station, only to find Gilda waiting there. “I thought you gave up going with us?” said Suri. “Oh, please,” said Gilda. “I just said that to fool the map. Now that I’m out of its range–” Lightning suddenly zapped Gilda again. “Okay, I won’t go for real!” she said. “Where’s the instruction manual for that thing? Maybe it says how to turn this off?” Gilda left, grumbling to herself. One train ride to Las Pegasus later… “All right!” declared Suri. “Now, what was the name of that resort again?” “Ponet Fantastique,” said Flim. “I think the T is silent,” said Suri. “Ponet Fantastique, then,” said Flim. “Such a pretentious-sounding title.” “Oh, pshaw,” said Suri. “That’s just a sign that’s it’s upper class.” “Actually, I think it’s the name of a show that’s at the resort right now, not the resort itself,” said Flam. “But I think the show is such a big attraction that it’s sort of been adopted as a name for the general resort, particularly as nopony ever bothered to come up with a name for the whole thing.” “Maybe the key to making money is to invest money into the performance!” said Suri. “Well, let’s just check into the hotel first.” The three went into the hotel lobby where various ponies milled about. “Hrm,” said Flim. “I wonder if one of these is how we’d…” Flim trailed off as he noticed a particular earth pony mare heading their way. “Uh-oh.” “Flim. Flam. Hello,” said Applejack coldly after reaching the three. “Applejack,” said Flam in an equally cold tone. Suri looked between them. “You know each other?” “Of course I know these two idiots,” said Applejack. “They keep trying to swindle others.” “Hey!” said Flim. “We never got convicted of anything worse than a misdemeanor!” “Because you pled guilty to get lesser charges,” said Applejack. “Not the point!” said Flam. “Besides, I’ll have you know that ever since that business with Silver Shill, we haven’t done anything that would plausibly get us in legal trouble! If I’m lying, may I be struck by hail!” Hail abruptly struck Flim. “Um, sorry about that,” said a nearby pegasus. “Been having some trouble with this cloud.” “See?” said Flam as the pegasus left. “I wasn’t the one struck! That proves my claim!” “Riiiight,” said Applejack in a flatly sarcastic tone. “As far as I know they haven’t done anything illegal,” said Suri. “And you are?” asked Applejack. “Suri Polomare!” declared Suri. “I–” Applejack pulled out a book and riffled through it. “Let’s see… ah, Suri Polomare, here you are. It says here you’re a convicted felon who served three months in prison for two convictions of assault. You originally only got sentenced to ten weeks, but had some extra time added for unruly behavior.” She slammed the book shut. “It’s not my fault the uniforms were so gaudy!” said Suri. “I had to break into storage in order to try to spice them up a little.” “Yes, well, it does mean I have less reason to take anything you say seriously,” said Applejack. “Does the fact my conviction came from beating up these guys help?” asked Suri as she pointed at Flim and Flam. “Wait, why are you just hanging around them nonchalantly if that happened?” said Applejack in a perplexed tone. “Oh, you know,” said Suri. “Someone lies to you and tricks you, you nearly kill them, you have to go to prison for a while and wear terrible-looking uniforms. It all evens itself out. What, that never happened to you?” “No, because I don’t make a habit of committing crimes!” Applejack rubbed her head in frustration. “Well, if you three don’t commit any crimes again, you’ll be fine. I have things to do now.” “Like what?” asked Suri. “Not your concern,” said Applejack before walking off. “Well, that felt pointless,” said Suri. “Unless she’s somehow connected to the cash we’ll get if we can figure out whatever the Tree of Whatever sent us to do?” “We haven’t really figured out what it could be about yet,” said Flim. “Who knows? It might be her. It might be gambling. Or it might be this lamp!” Flim pointed at a lamp, and they all stared at it for a little while. Nothing happened. “Okay, so it’s probably not that lamp,” said Flim. “But in the past, these things tended to just find us anyway, so maybe there’s no need to actively look for it.” “Fine,” said Suri. “Let’s use the opportunity to relax and–” “Greetings!” announced a purple-ish stallion as he came up to them. “Unless I have made a mistake, aren’t you two the creators of ‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not Cider!’?” “Why, yes!” said Flim. “It’s so nice to have somepony actually recognize us for that.” “Excellent! My name is Gladmane, and I was wondering if you two might be interested in you might use your advertising prowess to help advertise for Ponet Fantastique!” “How does it pay?” asked Flim. “Pretty well,” said Gladmane as he held up a piece of paper with a reasonably high number on it. “I’m in!” declared Flam. “I wouldn’t mind being paid ‘pretty well’ either. Need my help?” asked Suri eagerly. Gladmane peered at Suri briefly. “I greatly apologize, but I only need two. Accounting, you know.” “Aren’t you going to insist that you won’t sign up without me?” Suri asked Flim and Flam. “Not particularly, no,” said Flim. Suri grumbled to herself. “Well!” said Gladmane. “Shall we begin?” “Sure!” said Flam. “Suri, could you bring the rest of the luggage into the hotel room for us?” Before Suri gave any answer, the three had left, leaving her just standing there. “In retrospect, I really should have seen something like this coming,” she muttered to herself. “Well, I heard it’s easier to get into events by yourself anyway.” Suri went around and saw various attractions like the one in that one place, that other one in that other place, and the other other one in the aforementioned other place, not to be confused with another one that wasn’t mentioned in this paragraph. After the preceding sentence of filler, she went to the stage of Ponet Fantastique to try to find Flim and Flam. “Hey, so have you–” started Suri as she approached two ponies that were talking, but she was interrupted by their talking turning into an argument. “It isn’t just your show, and I’m improving it!” declared one of them. “You don’t pull a rabbit out of a hat on a trapeze!” said the other. The two continued their argument. “Um, hello?” asked Suri. They didn’t notice her. “Hello?” she asked more loudly, to still no response. “HELLO?!” she screamed, finally getting their attention. “Yes?” one of them asked. “Have you seen Flim or Flam?” asked Suri. “They were just hired, so you might not be familiar with them, but they’re two nearly identical unicorns with cutie marks of apples.” “Nope, haven’t seen them,” said one of the ponies, who then turned back to the other. “As I was saying, your ideas are terrible!” Suri shrugged and walked away to try to find other help as the two continued the argument. After encountering several arguing ponies who didn’t know where Flim and Flam were, she finally found some who did. “I think they left already,” said one of the ponies mentioned at the end of the preceding paragraph. “They were really annoyed with each other, though.” “It seems everypony around here is,” said Suri. “It’s too bad,” said the pony mentioned in the paragraph preceding the paragraph preceding this one. “They’d probably all be more successful if they got along better, as they could take the show on tour. But as long as they’re bickering, they’re sticking around here.” “Hrm,” Suri mused to herself before returning to the hotel room to find Flim and Flam arguing. “What’s the issue?” asked Suri wearily. “Gladmane told me he thinks I’m just a mouthpiece without a single good idea!” said Flim. “Gladmane told me that he said I couldn’t sell heat lamps to yaks!” said Flam. “I never said that!” said Flim. “Well, I never said what you said I said!” said Flam. “You lie!” they both shouted at each other. “Um, guys?” asked Suri. “Don’t you think it’s entirely possible that Gladmane just made up those claims?” Flim and Flam suddenly stopped arguing. “Huh,” said Flim. “That would make sense. In fact, buying into it so easily seemed uncharacteristically gullible of us.” “But why would Gladmane lie about something like that?” wondered Flam. His eyes widened. “There is only one possibility!” “What is it?” asked Suri. “Gladmane is actually a siren like the ones Sunset ran into in that alternate universe who is spreading discord in order to feed upon arguments, grow stronger, and destroy us all!” said Flam. “Or, possibly, simply conquer us all,” said Flam. “I’m not sure he’d gain anything from destroying us all.” Suri stared at them briefly. “Or, possibly,” she said in an irritated tone, “he’s just making you angry at each other to prevent you from leaving and using your talents elsewhere, as he seems to be doing for the rest of the show.” “That would seem more plausible, now that I think about it,” admitted Flam. “Only one thing to do, then!” said Flim. “Expose him for being a fraud, then buy his whole show at a cheap price to turn a profit!” “Great!” said Suri. “Now how do we do that? In the movies they trick them into admitting it while they’re being recorded or in an area where others can hear it. But I have the feeling he’d be too smart to fall for that.” “His entire plan relies on everypony blindly trusting him and never bothering to communicate with each other,” said Flam. “How smart can he be?” “He was smart enough to outwit you two,” said Suri. “Temporary insanity, that’s all that was!” declared Flam. “Fine,” said Suri. “What’s your plan, then?” “It’s obvious, now that I think about it,” said Flim. “All we have to do is tell everypony he’s tricked that he’s tricked them. Then they’ll all get along again and his plans will be thwarted! And maybe they’ll be so grateful for showing them the truth that they’ll give us lots of money in gratitude! Let’s go!” And so the three went and told everyone involved that Gladmane had been manipulating them, causing them all to feel very stupid for falling for such an obvious ploy. “I feel very stupid for falling for such an obvious ploy,” one of them said. “That seemed awfully easy,” said Flim after rest of the group left to tell off Gladmane. “Although, I’m disappointed they didn’t give us lots of money in thanks.” “I thought the plan was to buy the whole thing for cheap due to the devaluing?” said Suri. “Sure,” said Flam. “But in previous cases the money came much more naturally and easily. We’d be able to buy it for cheap, but it’d only be worth a little, so it feels like it’d take some time and money to fix the place up in order to make a profit.” “Who knows?” said Suri. “Maybe we’ll find a winning lottery ticket or something as a result of this.” Just then, the crowd of ponies returned, all arguing with each other. “I’m not taking this show on the road until you apologize!” declared one. “I’m not leaving until you apologize!” shouted another at the previous one. “Huh?” said a perplexed Suri. “Why are they all arguing again?” She went up to one of them. “Why are you all arguing again? Didn’t you all realize that Gladmane made up all the stories about you?” “Oh, right!” they said. “Let’s go and tell him off!” The group rushed back into Gladmane’s room. A short time later, they emerged, arguing with each other again. “Okay, seriously, what is going on?” asked Suri. “Is this all a big prank on me?” “Well,” said Flim “maybe we should just go and confront him outselves.” “Ourselves,” said Suri. “Isn’t that what I said?” asked Flim. “No, you said confront him outselves,” said Suri. “Oh,” said Flim. “Well, I meant to say ourselves.” “Actually, wait a minute,” said Suri. “What if he’s using some kind of magic to cause the arguments? That would explain why they suddenly went back to arguing. If we try confronting him, the same thing might happen to us.” “Hrm,” mused Flam. “That is a valid point. How should we proceed, then?” “How should I know? You two are the unicorns! I’d think you’d understand magic more than I would!” She paused. “Wait, weren’t you selling some kind of anti-mind control hat a few years ago? Why not use that?” “Oh, that,” said Flam. “Those may or may not have actually been normal hats with no special properties whatsoever.” “So it was a scam?” asked Suri. “It had an 82.9% success rate according to our customers!” said Flam. “Which may or may not have been due to the placebo effect.” Suri rolled her eyes. “Fine. So why don’t you two go in and confront him while I stay out here? If there’s some sort of weird mind control going on, I’d at least be immune due to not being in there.” “Why should we be the ones to take the risk?” asked Flim. “Because it’d make more sense not to split you two up,” said Suri. “You’re too interchangeable.” And so Flim and Flam went to confront Gladmane. Soon afterwards, they came back arguing again. “How could you–” started Flim before being interrupted by Suri. “Okay,” said Suri, “so I suppose there is something weird going on if you’re still arguing.” “What do you mean?” asked Flam. “My ex-brother of mine said–” “Do you have any reason to believe that he said this outside of Gladmane saying that?” asked Suri wearily. Flam paused. “Hrm, you’re right. In fact, didn’t we go in there with the idea that he had been faking us out into arguments?” “And the last horse crosses the finish line,” said Suri. “Well, let’s see what we got.” She grabbed Flim and Flam’s bowties. “Wait, what are you doing?” asked Flim. “Oh, I planted some miniature microphones on your bowties,” said Suri. “I didn’t tell you because if there was some kind of mind control you might mention it to Gladmane. Now, let’s listen to what happened.” She pressed a button. “So!” came Suri’s voice out of the microphone. “I was wondering if you might be willing to do me a favor.” “What’s in it for us?” asked Flim’s voice. “The point of a favor is you don’t have self-interest in it!” came Suri’s voice. “Erm,” said Suri in the present. “Hang on. I think I may have to fast forward a bit.” “Exactly how long have these been recording what we say?” asked Flam. “You probably don’t want to know,” said Suri. “Ah, here we are.” “All right, Gladmane!” came Flam’s voice. “We know what’s going on! We know your secret!” “Eek!” came Gladmane’s voice. “How did you find out about the beans?” “Er… no, this has nothing to do with beans,” said Flim. “What we mean is that we know you’re telling everypony under your employment lies about each other in order to make them argue and stick around!” “But not anything involving beans, right?” asked Gladmane. “No, nothing about beans,” said Flim. “Phew!” said Gladmane. “You had me worried there.” Ordinarily eye rolling isn’t something that can be conveyed in an audio-exclusive medium, but somehow Flam managed it. “Do you have anything to say in response to the accusation about making up stories? Like when you told me false things about my brother?” “Oh, you’re just being silly,” said Gladmane. “Don’t blame me for the fact your brother told me you were a small-time thinker.” “Really?!” exclaimed Flam. “Flim, how dare you!” “And Flim, Flam here said that you thought you were the only brains of the operation,” continued Gladmane. There was an awkward pause. “Huh?” asked Flim. “Your phrasing was so confusing I don’t know what you meant.” “Er, I mean, Flam said that he thought Flim believed he was the only one with any smarts,” said Gladmane. “Oh, that phrasing is less ambiguous,” said Flim. “And how dare you, Flam!” “Just as a quick question,” said Gladmane, “do either of you have any recording devices on you?” “No,” said Flim and Flam simultaneously before returning to argue with each other on the audio. “How odd,” said Flim. “Us falling for that this quickly doesn’t make sense. He must have some kind of mind control.” “Maybe he is one of those sirens after all!” said Flam. “Okay then,” said Suri. “We at least established there is mind control going on. So how do we handle that?” She paused. “Actually, wait just a moment. Why are we working so hard to fix things here? We agreed that the plan to buy out the place didn’t seem very profitable. So what do we actually get out of all of this?” “Hrm,” said Flim. “A valid point. We got so caught up in the excitement that we forgot why we came here to begin with! We need to go find the actual way to get money!” “It does feel odd to leave this unresolved, though,” said Suri. “Doesn’t that Applejack girl work for the government? Can’t we just alert her and let her do all the hard work? Maybe it’d even make her dislike you two less.” “Well,” said Flam, “I suppose it can’t hurt.” “Let’s find her, then,” said Suri. She frowned. “Wait, do we have any way to contact her? I have no idea where she even is.” Flim pointed. “Isn’t that her right over there?” “Oh, I guess it is,” said Suri. She went over to Applejack. “Can I talk to you?” “What is it?” asked Applejack. “This guy named Gladmane, who’s in charge of the Ponet Fantastique show, came over and asked Flim and Flam to join up with him in order to help advertise the show. But then they started arguing with each other, which seemed really odd, but then I found out it was because he told each of them the other was being insulting towards them. We quickly figured out that was just something he made up, so we went to investigate it more, and it turns out everypony else in the show was the victim of that. It seems the goal was to keep them all there instead of moving elsewhere so that he could continue to benefit from it. We went and told the rest of the show this, and it seemed like they were going to go and tell off Gladmane, but then they all started arguing again with each other. We reminded them of what was going on and they went back, then started arguing again due to taking his claims seriously. We thought maybe something really weird was going on, possibly involving mind control, so Flim and Flam went in to try it, but I bugged them to record the audio. It can’t be completely confirmed because it was just audio, but it did sound like he was doing some kind of mind control on them to make them argue, which may or may not be related to the abilities of these sirens in this alternate universe that Sunset visited, although the sirens were originally from this universe. Of course, it could be something different, but it does seem similar. But then we weren’t sure what to do with that information, and you happened to be here, so now we’re reporting it all to you,” explained Suri. “Hrm,” said Applejack. “That does coincide with some of the suspicions I’ve had of him. I was going to start on a more direct investigation, but this would expedite things. Do you still have the recording? That could be important evidence.” “Right here!” said Suri as she handed it over. “This will certainly make things easier,” said Applejack. “Need any more help?” asked Flim. Applejack eyed him suspiciously. “What’s your motivation?” “Mostly revenge for the mind control,” said Flim. “No, I think I can take it from here,” said Applejack. “However, I will say thank you for alerting the proper authorities of this, rather than trying to engage in some convoluted scheme to expose him yourself that would likely fail.” “Well, I guess that at least helped us towards revenge,” said Flam after Applejack left. “But we’re still no closer to making any cash!” “You don’t think a good deed is its own reward?” suggested Suri. “No,” said Flam. “Just making sure,” said Suri. “There’s got to be some way to make our cash around here. The tree wouldn’t have sent us here otherwise, right?” “Well,” said Flim, “I suppose we could just try to have a good time at the resort. Maybe we’ll discover it in the process. Even if we don’t, it’d at least be fun.” A decent degree of vacationing later… “Well, I guess that was enjoyable enough,” said Suri. “But we still haven’t found anything.” “Hello!” said an official-looking pony as he went up to them. He looked at a list. “Are you three Huey, Dewey, and Louie?” “Um… no?” said Flim. “In that case,” continued the aforementioned pony as he checked the list again, “are you Flim, Flam, and Suri?” “That one is true,” said Flam. “Oh, good,” he said. “There was a reward posted for information leading to the recovery of those pieces of the siren pendants, and your tip helped lead to that.” “The recovery of the what now?” asked Suri. He raised an eyebrow. “Well, there were these sirens, and they used pendants–” “I know that part!” said Suri. “What’s this about recovery of fragments?” “Apparently fragments of one of the pendants ended up coming back into this world, but it went missing. It looks like that Gladmane character found it and managed to, with a rubber band and polaron resequencer, reactivate it to a limited extent; it could cause arguments, but it couldn’t gain power from them. Anyway, there was a reward for information leading to finding them.” “Why would there be a reward for that when there’d be no reason to believe the pendants or fragments of them were even in this universe to begin with?” asked Flam. “Oh, it was offered a long time ago, when the sirens were an active threat,” said the messenger. “Everypony forgot all about it until now, so it never got revoked.” “How much of a reward?” asked Flim eagerly. “A pretty big one,” said the messenger. He held up a piece of paper with a number written on it. “Wait, that much?!” asked Flam in a stunned voice. The messenger looked at the piece of paper again. “Oh, I’m sorry, wrong paper.” He pulled out another one. “Here you go.” “That’s less, but still pretty good,” said Flim. “Well, it looks like everything worked out fine, then,” said the messenger. “Also, do you know where I might find Huey, Dewey, and Louie?” “Haven’t got a clue,” said Suri. “Darn it,” he said as she walked off. “Well,” said Suri, “at least we got our money.” “A good time to have it, too!” said Flim. “Our sales have suffered a bit due to the knock-off ‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not ‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not Cider!’!’ cutting into our business. This should help jump-start things back to normal.” “I suppose that with this new money, we can also make our vacation here last a bit longer,” said Suri. “Though I wonder where Gladmane got the pendant pieces.” “Most likely those Shadowbolt guys grabbed some of them before running back into our universe through the portal,” said Suri. “Speaking of which, I wonder what happened to them?” “And you all doubted me,” said Stormy Skies in a satisfied tone. “Selling those pendant fragments to get a good amount of cash, then wisely investing it in a number of illegal and legal ventures, making us millionaires?” “Well, it did work out a lot better than any world-conquering scheme did,” admitted Thunder Strike. “So long as no inspector looks too deeply into our finances and discovers the various discrepancies, we’re home free!” “Um, sir?” asked a pony as he entered the room. “There’s somepony that wants to speak to you from the government. She says her name’s Applejack.” “Why do I suddenly have a bad feeling about this?” wondered Thunder Strike. “Hrm,” said Maelstrom Tempest. “And that’s how they managed to arrest Gladmane, recover those pendant fragments, and safely dispose of them!” said Chrysalis. “They also discovered his illegal bean operation and put a stop to that too. So, how was that? Did you think it was a good summation of that case?” “Yes, I suppose it was a good enough summation,” said Luna in a tired tone. “As you claimed you wanted to say all this to me in order for me to provide a test audience, now will you tell me who you wanted to deliver this summation to?” “Oh, I was going to report it to you,” said Chrysalis. “I figured you were the best test audience for yourself! But now that I’ve already done it, I realize I don’t need to do it again.” Luna sighed. “But,” said Chrysalis, “that name seems familiar. Gladmane, Gladmane… where did I hear that before?” She paused, then took on an irritated look. “Oh, darn it, now I remember,” said Chrysalis grumpily. “Hrm?” asked Luna. Chrysalis took out a piece of paper with various names on it, then crossed out one that said ‘Gladmane.’ “I can’t believe I found another one. This is ridiculous.” “Gladmane was on that list?” asked Luna. “Yep,” said Chrysalis in a sour tone. “You know, when I made this list of ‘pony names so completely ridiculous no one would ever actually name their kid it,’ I didn’t expect to actually be so many of them, as evidenced by the title. I’ll admit Gladmane isn’t as silly as Quibble Pants was, but there’s only two left on this! Honestly, if I happen to find ponies named Fizzlepop Berrytwist and Star Butterfly, there is a distinct chance that I’m going to go crazy and become some kind of despotic dictator that wants to imprison all the ponies, including you, in some sort of weird goopy liquid thing and forcibly feed off their love.” Luna stared blankly at Chrysalis. “Oh, don’t worry,” said Chrysalis cheerfully. “You’d still keep your dental plan. Not the pension, though.” “Well, anyway,” said Suri to Flim, “want to go out on that pretend date I suggested?” “Well, I was feeling hungry,” admitted Flim. “Wait, why him and not me?” asked Flam. “I flipped a coin,” said Suri. “Let’s go!” A short time later, at a restaurant… “So!” said Suri. “What are your interests?” “Mostly making money,” said Flim. “What a coincidence!” said Suri. “That’s one of mine also. Do you–” “By the way,” said the waitress, “which one of you is paying?” “Why does it matter?” asked Suri. “We’ve had some problems with disputes about who pays, so we want to make sure it’s decided upon ahead of time,” said the waitress. “Well,” said Suri, “I think you should pay. I believe you’re the wealthier of the two of us.” “Why should I pay?” asked Flim. “Coming here was your idea!” “Why would I ever go out on a date if I wasn’t saving money somehow?” demanded Suri. “Well, that’s what I was thinking!” snapped Flim. “I’m not going to pay money just to indulge you!” An argument quickly erupted between the two. “Um,” said the waitress, “if you could–” “You know what?!” said Suri. “I think this was a terrible idea to begin with! I’m just going to leave. You pay for yourself if you want!” “Well, I…” Flim suddenly trailed off. “Wait. Is this a real argument about paying, or is this all part of the fake date?” “I’m… not sure myself,” said Suri hesitantly. The two stared at each other briefly. “Let’s never do this again,” said Suri. “Agreed,” said Flim. The waitress watched the two leave, then grinned to herself before taking off her disguise and leaving the restaurant as well. “Well,” said Gilda, “glad I nipped that in the bud.” She was abruptly struck by lightning. “Worth it!”